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New Kinds of e-Commerce

By Sean F. Kane
July 31, 2006

As more people live in the virtual world ' sometimes also called the digital or synthetic world ' in one of the many so-called massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMPORGs) available online, the potential for monetary abuse and malfeasance grows.

While private gaming companies built the original virtual worlds for their subscriber base, and were controlled by designers and end-user licensing agreements (EULAs), new MMPORGs provide players with more freedoms ' including the ability to create, seclude or launder wealth, a very different kind of e-commerce from that to which e-commerce pioneers are accustomed.

The likelihood of this new technology being co-opted for unscrupulous purposes is great, as historically, the same thing has happened after other technological advances, such as 'property' created for a game can be misappropriated, even leading to violence (see, 'Virtual Worlds And Digital Rights' in the Sept. 2005 edition of our sibling newsletter, Internet Law & Strategy).

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